Sa’eed (junior)
Character Analysis

Sa’eed is seven years old. He is the youngest son to Mustafa Sa’eed and Hosna bint Mahmoud, and the younger brother to Mahmoud. He is named after his paternal grandfather. Right before his death, Mustafa Sa’eed designates the narrator as guardian of Sa’eed and his brother and asks the narrator to spare his sons the pangs of “wanderlust.” Sa’eed and his brother end up as orphans after their mother dies of suicide after killing Wad Rayyes.

Sa’eed (junior) Quotes in Season of Migration to the North

The Season of Migration to the North quotes below are all either spoken by Sa’eed (junior) or refer to Sa’eed (junior). For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

).
Note: all page numbers and citation info for the quotes below refer to the NYRB Classics edition of Season of Migration to the North published in 2009.

Chapter 4
Quotes

“…mysterious things in my soul and in my blood impel me towards faraway parts that loom up before me and cannot be ignored. How sad it would be if either or both of my sons grew up with the germ of this infection in them, the wanderlust.”

Sa’eed (junior) Character Timeline in Season of Migration to the North

The timeline below shows where the character Sa’eed (junior) appears in Season of Migration to the North. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Chapter 3

On a July night, during a summer season when the Nile river floods, Mustafa Sa’eed disappears. The village men search for him along the riverbank, but they cannot find his...
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Although Mustafa Sa’eed died two years earlier, the narrator continues to think of him while living in Khartoum....
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The narrator listens to the Mamur, without mentioning that he himself had known Mustafa Sa’eed, and that he has died by drowning (quite possibly a suicide). When he died, Mustafa...
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...begins discussing who was the first Sudanese to marry an English woman. Someone identifies Mustafa Sa’eed as the first.
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The man who identifies Sa’eed says that Sa’eed had settled in England and had worked for the British in the...
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An Englishman at the party goes on to recount what he heard about Mustafa Sa’eed: that he had become a darling of the British aristocracy in England, as well as...
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Chapter 4

...states that he does not want them to think that he became obsessed with Mustafa Sa’eed after his death, although he continues to return to the village every year from Khartoum...
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On one such visit to the village, the narrator’s mind wanders back to Mustafa Sa’eed, especially since Sa’eed had left him a letter before his death, designating the narrator as...
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In the letter, Mustafa Sa’eed asks the narrator to spare Mustafa’s two sons Mahmoud and Sa’eed the “pangs of wanderlust.”...
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The narrator reflects that, if Mustafa Sa’eed has committed suicide, then he has undertaken the most “melodramatic” act of his life. He...
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The narrator recalls Mustafa Sa’eed telling him that, at his trial, the jurors deprived him of the death that he...
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...father, testifying in the trial, said that he could not be sure whether to blame Sa’eed for his daughter’s suicide, or whether she had simply undergone a spiritual crisis. And so,...
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Chapter 6

That very same day, the narrator visits Mustafa Sa’eed’s house. He is greeted by Sa’eed’s widow Hosna and her two sons, Mahmoud and Sa’eed....
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Hosna tells the narrator that it was as if, before his death, Mustafa Sa’eed knew his end was coming. He had arranged everything beforehand—paying off his debts, and even...
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...the future—about marrying again. She says she will never marry after the death of Mustafa Sa’eed. When the narrator mentions Wad Rayyes’s interest in her, she says she will kill him...
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...the details of Hosna’s murder-suicide, the narrator stands outside of the secret room in Mustafa Sa’eed’s house. He enters. Inside, he strikes a match and sees a face. He thinks it...
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The books on the walls are on all topics; among them are Mustafa Sa’eed’s own published books. None of the books is in Arabic. Above the mantelpiece is a...
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Another signed photograph depicts Isabella Seymour. When she met Mustafa Sa’eed, she was a church-goer and a married woman, raising two children. In a letter she...
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Sa’eed would quote Arabic poetry to Ann Hammond, and she would tell him that in his...
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The narrator picks up a photo of Mustafa Sa’eed with Mrs. Robinson and Mr. Robinson in Cairo, in 1913, and remembers the letter he...
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The narrator opens a notebook entitled “My Life Story—by Mustafa Sa’eed.” There is hardly anything in the notebook, except for a cryptic sentence. He finds sketchbooks...
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...turns to the painting of Jean Morris above the English mantelpiece. He recalls, again, Mustafa Sa’eed’s story of his relationship with Jean Morris, how she would torment and humiliate him at...
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After their marriage, Jean Morris refused to let Mustafa Sa’eed sleep with her. Two months into the marriage, he threatened her with a knife. She...
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While Mustafa Sa’eed had his moments of ecstasy with Jean, most of the time they were at war,...
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One cold winter’s night in February, Mustafa Sa’eed returned home to find Jean Morris stretched out naked on the bed in his London...
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